Number of results to display per page
Search Results
1802. Serbia After Djindjic: Can Invigorated Reforms Be Sustained?
- Author:
- Vladimir Matic
- Publication Date:
- 10-2003
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Public International Law Policy Group
- Abstract:
- The assassinated prime minister of Serbia, Zoran Djindjic, appears to have won in death much of what he could not achieve in life. His concept of Serbia's way out of the domestic political and economic crisis through reform and membership in a democratic Europe has prevailed over one representing the past; Serbia is finally open to cooperation with the world. But the national consensus he was dreaming about does not yet exist. The prevalence and reach of networks of organized crime and corruption limit prospects for significant further structural change and more serious consolidation of the rule of law. The Serbian people have put aside for the moment their infatuation with radical nationalism rather than exorcising it from their society and intellectual culture. The success of such reform as has been implemented is far from secured. For the time being the joint efforts of the leading pro-democratization parties of Serbia and Montenegro have brought about the beginning of long-postponed changes in the army and initiated far-reaching reforms. This allows continuation of reforms in Serbian services and strengthening of the basic institutions of democracy. If continued, expanded and intensified, this course will take both Serbia and Montenegro irrespective of the final destiny of their Union closer to democracy and to the European Union and the United States.
- Topic:
- Democratization, Government, and Politics
- Political Geography:
- United States, Europe, and Serbia
1803. The United States, China, and Taiwan: A Future With Hope
- Author:
- James Lilley
- Publication Date:
- 10-2003
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Public International Law Policy Group
- Abstract:
- You have clearly worked over the complicated relationship between Taiwan and China. I can only try to build on what Dr. Lin Chong--pin and Mr. Rostow have already described so lucidly. I would like to point out first that China chooses, for both tactical and emotional reasons, to place a special heavy emphasis on its relationship with Taiwan and to its point that Taiwan is part of China. Emotional, because this stirs up nationalism among a skeptical Chinese elite who have lost ideology. Tactical, because driving home the unity and sovereignty themes forces the U.S. on the defensive, i.e., the U.S. interferes in China's internal affairs, a cardinal sin in China's own lexicon. In reality, however, China has been practical. For almost fifty years Chinese propaganda has focused on Taiwan as a pure target, but objective circumstances have changed and so has China's strategy. China took over the Ta Chen Islands peacefully in 1954, its last significant territorial acquisition in the Taiwan Strait. Its later more militaristic approach against a well--defended Quemoy (Chin men) failed in 1958, and China retreated with much bluster and firing of cannons, many of them empty.
- Topic:
- Politics and Sovereignty
- Political Geography:
- United States, China, Taiwan, and Asia
1804. What is Sovereignty? The Cases of Taiwan and Micronesia
- Author:
- Peter R. Rosenblatt
- Publication Date:
- 10-2003
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Public International Law Policy Group
- Abstract:
- The title of my contribution to this discussion raises a point that is easy to overlook in discussions relating to the legal status of the Republic of China (ROC) on Taiwan. The range of options across the Strait is not confined, as the title of this conference suggests, to the reunification of China or Taiwan's independence, although either of these is obviously a possibility. A more likely option, in my judgment, is some future status for the ROC which involves neither incorporation into the People's Republic of China nor the challenging step of a declaration of “independence” as the Republic of Taiwan. This third option embraces a multiplicity of status shadings involving a continuing evolution of the ROC's current status of de facto independence. It is this option that I would like to address.
- Topic:
- Politics and Sovereignty
- Political Geography:
- China, Taiwan, and Asia
1805. Executive Leadership and the Role of “Veto Players” in the United States and Germany
- Author:
- Ludger Helms
- Publication Date:
- 10-2003
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Minda de Gunzburg Center for European Studies, Harvard University
- Abstract:
- In recent comparative works on the constitutional structures of contemporary liberal democracies, the United States and Germany have been grouped together as examples of democratic systems with an exceptionally high degree of “institutional pluralism”. In other typologies both countries have even been classified as “semisovereign democracies”. Whereas such classifications are of some use, especially in the field of public policy research, they fail to pay reasonable attention to the fundamental difference between parliamentary and presidential government that dominated the older literature on comparative political systems. As the comparative assessments offered in this paper suggest, the difference between parliamentary government and presidential government does not only constitute very different conditions of executive leadership in the core executive territory and at the level of executive-legislative relations, but has also a strong impact on the role and performance of the various “veto players” that characterize the political systems of the United States and Germany, and which are at the center of this paper.
- Topic:
- Government and Politics
- Political Geography:
- United States, Europe, and Germany
1806. European Corporate Governance Reform and the German Party Paradox
- Author:
- Martin Höpner
- Publication Date:
- 08-2003
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Minda de Gunzburg Center for European Studies, Harvard University
- Abstract:
- This paper addresses the current discussion on links between party politics and production regimes. Why do German Social Democrats opt for more corporate governance liberalization than the CDU although, in terms of the distributional outcomes of such reforms, one would expect the situation to be reversed? I divide my analysis into three stages. First, I use the European Parliament's crucial vote on the European takeover directive in July 2001 as a test case to show that the left-right dimension does indeed matter in corporate governance reform, beside cross-class and cross-party nation-based interests. In a second step, by analyzing the party positions in the main German corporate governance reforms in the 1990s, I show that the SPD and the CDU behave “paradoxically” in the sense that the SPD favored more corporate governance liberalization than the CDU, which protected the institutions of “Rhenish,” “organized” capitalism. This constellation occurred in the discussions on company disclosure, management accountability, the power of banks, network dissolution, and takeover regulation. Third, I offer two explanations for this paradoxical party behavior. The first explanation concerns the historical conversion of ideas. I show that trade unions and Social Democrats favored a high degree of capital organization in the Weimar Republic, but this ideological position was driven in new directions at two watersheds: one in the late 1940s, the other in the late 1950s. My second explanation lies in the importance of conflicts over managerial control, in which both employees and minority shareholders oppose managers, and in which increased shareholder power strengthens the position of works councils.
- Topic:
- Democratization, Government, and Politics
- Political Geography:
- Europe and Germany
1807. Elements for a Structural Constructivist Theory of Politics and of European Integration
- Author:
- Niilo Kauppi
- Publication Date:
- 07-2003
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Minda de Gunzburg Center for European Studies, Harvard University
- Abstract:
- Pierre Bourdieu's structural constructivist theory of politics offers powerful instruments for a critical analysis of political power. In this paper, I explore structural constructivism as a theory of politics and of European integration. By structural constructivism I refer to a mostly French research tradition that develops some of Bourdieu's theoretical tools. In European studies, social constructivism has provided an alternative to traditional approaches such as intergovernmentalism and neofunctionalism. Structural constructivism remedies some of the weaknesses of most versions of social constructivism, such as their diffuse conception of power and ideational notion of culture. This paper develops a structural constructivist approach that examines the European Union as a multileveled and polycentric emerging political field.
- Topic:
- International Organization and Politics
- Political Geography:
- Europe
1808. Does the process really matter? Some reflections on the "legitimating effect" of the European Convention
- Author:
- Paul Magnette
- Publication Date:
- 07-2003
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Minda de Gunzburg Center for European Studies, Harvard University
- Abstract:
- The European Convention, set up by the Heads of state and governments during the Laeken Summit of December 2001, was presented by its initiators as a means of strengthening the legitimacy of the EU. Is this a rhetorical argument of politicians, which could be explained by the intense electoral cycle of 2002- 2004? Or is there something, in the process of the Convention, that could change the nature of the EU constitution?
- Topic:
- International Organization and Politics
- Political Geography:
- Europe
1809. Portugese Ministers, 1851-1999: Social Background and Paths to Power
- Author:
- Pedro Tavares de Almeida and António Costa Pinto
- Publication Date:
- 05-2003
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Minda de Gunzburg Center for European Studies, Harvard University
- Abstract:
- This paper provides an empirical analysis of the impact of regime changes in the composition and patterns of recruitment of the Portuguese ministerial elite throughout the last 150 years. The 'out-of-type', violent nature of most regime transformations accounts for the purges in and the extensive replacements of the political personnel, namely of the uppermost officeholders. In the case of Cabinet members, such discontinuities did not imply, however, radical changes in their social profile. Although there were some significant variations, a series of salient characteristics have persisted over time. The typical Portuguese minister is a male in his midforties, of middle-class origin and predominantly urban-born, highly educated and with a state servant background. The two main occupational contingents have been university professors - except for the First Republic (1910-26) - and the military, the latter having only recently been eclipsed with the consolidation of contemporary democracy. As regards career pathways, the most striking feature is the secular trend for the declining role of parliamentary experience, which the democratic regime did not clearly reverse. In this period, a technocratic background rather than political experience has been indeed the privileged credential for a significant proportion of ministers.
- Topic:
- Government and Politics
- Political Geography:
- Europe
1810. Ministerial Elites in Greece, 1843-2001: A Synthesis of Old Sources and New Data
- Author:
- Dimitri A. Sotiropoulos and Dimitris Bourikos
- Publication Date:
- 05-2003
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Minda de Gunzburg Center for European Studies, Harvard University
- Abstract:
- The study of Greek political elites used to be concentrated on parliamentary deputies. Ministerial elites were rarely studied. In this paper, we take a long-term view of the Greek ministerial elites, studying their socio-political profile from the mid-nineteenth century to the present. We find that this profile does not change so much with regime change, but instead follows political developments at certain time points within specific regime periods. At these points, new political leaders were ushered into power. Examples were Eleftherios Venizelos in 1911 and Andreas Papandreou in 1981. Changes in personnel were not accompanied by changes in geographical origin or professional outlook, which took much longer to effect. In the nineteenth century mainly landowners and state officials dominated cabinets. After the beginning of the twentieth century, however, liberal professions, particularly lawyers, were overrepresented among ministers. This pattern continued throughout the twentieth century. Both the predominance of lawyers and the changes in the profile of ministers over time are attributed to the type of state built in modern Greece, a clientelist, overcentralized and legalistic state which only recently has started its transformation, requiring a different, more modern type of politician.
- Topic:
- Government, Nationalism, and Politics
- Political Geography:
- Europe and Greece